


Memories

by pine_storm_season



Series: loosely canon writings [2]
Category: Dream SMP - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Gen, hehe ghostbur memory loss go brrr :), uhh idk what else to put here oops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-21
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:33:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27651386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pine_storm_season/pseuds/pine_storm_season
Summary: wilbur tries to remember. it doesn't go too well.
Series: loosely canon writings [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2191365
Comments: 2
Kudos: 155





	Memories

**Author's Note:**

> warnings: flashbacks (kinda), distress, and if there's anything else that needs warning for please tell me and i'll add it.

“So what do you remember?” asks Tubbo. He's sitting on the edge of the crater, absentmindedly knocking his heels into the stone as he talks.

“I…don't remember much, I think,” Wilbur says. He comes and sits next to Tubbo, anxiously tugging at the left sleeve of his yellow sweater with his right hand. “There are a lot of gaps, in my memory. I don't know exactly what happened.”

“That's okay,” Tubbo says. “Just tell me what you do remember, then!”

“Okay,” Wilbur says, “uh… I remember a war.”

“A war?”

“Yeah, against Dream and George and Sapnap, and uh… Then my memory goes kinda blank, and then I remember we won! Right, Tubbo?” Wilbur turns to look at Tubbo, still tugging at his sweater sleeve.

“Yeah, we did! We won that war,” Tubbo tells him, grinning. He leans into Wilbur, and Wilbur smiles too, looking pleased.

“And then I remember… we had an election, and… and me and Tommy won! And then it's blank, and then I was in a ravine, and then… I died and became a ghost.”

“Yep, that all happened, Wilbur,” Tubbo confirms, nodding. Relief floods into Wilbur, much more than he was expecting. “There's, uh, some stuff you were missing, though. Do you want me to tell you?”

Oh.

Wilbur is suddenly very afraid for what he might hear.

“Yes,” he says anyway, because this is Tubbo. Tubbo will stop if Wilbur tells him to. And not knowing is almost as scary.

“Okay so uh, the election. You did win, yeah! But then, then the coalition government of—”

_A deep voice ringing out across a crowd._

_“—revoke the citizenship of Wi—”_

_The ashy taste of an invisibility potion and the pain of an arrow to the shoulder and a voice crying his name, shouting, grabbing his hand and running—_

_Pacing back and forth at the bottom of a ravine, words in his mouth that he couldn’t understand but made Tommy flinch back, Tommy, his brother—_

_A room with writing scribbled on the walls and a button, a plain wooden button, why did he want so badly to press the button—_

_An explosion—_

_The pain of a sword running through him and his father’s anguished face—_

Wilbur gasped as Tubbo pulled him back onto solid land, away from the edge he’d nearly fallen off of.

“Wilbur, are you okay? Are you okay, big man?”

“I don't think I'd like to hear more,” he said shakily, standing on trembling legs and backing away from the crater.

“That's okay!” Tubbo stood, taking Wilbur’s hand and smiling at him reassuringly. “Do you want to see if you remember anything else? Or are you done with memories for, for now?”

“I—I think I'm done,” Wilbur said. “That was, uh…yeah. I'm done.”

His head was spinning. He needed to get away from the crater that he recognized and also didn't, he needed to get away from Tubbo's concerned voice and incessant questions, he just—

He needed to be able to think.

//

The pen shook slightly as he wrote.

_Things I Remember:_

A shiver ran through him at the thought of the fragmented pieces of memories he'd seen earlier. He wouldn't write that. He didn't want to write that.

What was something he remembered?

 _Winning a war,_ Wilbur wrote. He smiled at the memory. Him, Tommy, Tubbo, his son. L’manburg. His country.

Fundy! That was another thing he remembered.

 _Fundy_ , he wrote, then after a pause, added _“growing up”_. Under that he put _“Sally”_ and _“L’manburg”._ The smile spread across his face. These were good memories. Nothing that Alive Wilbur had done wrong. Tommy had told him that Alive Wilbur had done some awful stuff.

“He didn't hurt anyone, did he?” Wilbur had asked.

_Fundy's face falling as Wilbur laughed, what had he said, what had he said—_

_Tubbo screaming over the sound of an explosion, over the sound of fireworks—_

_Tommy yelling at Wilbur, just as fierce as a cornered alley cat—_

Wilbur shuddered. He didn't remember. He didn't want to remember.

 _Niki_ , he wrote, trying to ignore what had just happened. _The smell of bread._

 _An explosion,_ he wrote without thinking. He stared at the words. Then he scribbled them out, with harsh, quick strokes of the pen.

He hesitated.

_An explosion._

He didn't remember an explosion.

He scribbled it out again.

_“You're my **son**!” Phil yelled, diamond sword in hand, over the sound of an explosion— _

_“Tubbo, you are president of a **crater** —” _

_Screaming—_

_Fire—_

_Smoke—_

_Pain—_

Wilbur's pen dropped from his hand to the floor.

_An explosion._

He didn't scribble it out this time.

“Think, Wil, think,” he muttered, clutching at his head. Oh, it hurt. Oh, he was scared. Scared of what he might remember, of what he might do next.

Techno.

There was something he could focus on.

There was something that didn't hurt to think about.

 _Sparring with Techno as kids,_ he wrote. The letters wobbled and dragged into each other, but there they stood. A happy memory. A safe thing to think about. _Bullying Tommy. Pranks. Fundy and Tubbo setting traps everywhere and him falling into them, yelling but he wasn’t actually mad._

_A blackstone room, with empty chests and a deep voice that sounded like Eret and a button, a button on the floor that clicked and made a sound like pistons, like screaming—_

A sob tore its way out of Wilbur’s throat.

“Get it together,” he whispered. “You’re not even alive anymore, that's stuff that happened to Alive Wilbur, you don't have to think about it—”

Oh, his head hurt.

Wilbur closed his eyes and tried not to cry.


End file.
